Lost MBR

I had a had drive error recently and the system now reports an unpartitioned drive. I can see the data using EasyRecovery but the file table is obviously screwed coc the files are broken into separate parts.

I have read about fixmbr in XP - does anyone have any ideas on this or other recovery methods or is 5 years of work lost?

Yes - Im know I should have backed up! The drive failed as I was installing a new DVD Writer for such a purpose!

Can't get into the Recovery screens as the drive is not recognised. The XP install routine picks up an unpartitioned area [76mb, size of disk] and I can not delete it or write another partition.

I should mention that EasyRecovery s/ware shows me all the files but they are fragmented. Small files such as shortcuts to urls from my favourites list have been recovered.

Is there any way of restoring the MBR [or is the File Allocation table itself?] so that the files can be retrieved. I mainly want Word docs - their parts are picked up by the WordFix element of the software but cannot be joined up correctly